Firstly thank you to Netgalley and Penguin UK for this copy in exchange for an honest review.

This is a very readable thriller/mystery, it’s well-paced and it has a very “just one more chapter” quality. I lost a couple of hours sleep wanting to find out more and that is always a good sign.

Although clumsy at times I enjoyed how the author integrated the characters recounting the events in the woods with the present day story of Fleet trying to solve the mystery. It was easy to identify the parts where teenagers were recounting the events, as the writing style shifts becoming abit rambling and uneven. Some may find this annoying however I found it quite clever, as this is how teenagers talk.

Enjoyable with a satisfying conclusion.

Told in multiple perspectives, The Search Party is about a group of friends who went out looking for their missing friend, only for the ordeal to end up with one dead party. The story is told through the voices of the people involved in the search party, as well as the Detective Inspector in charge of the case, who was also battling his own personal demons by being back in the town.

This was a page turner. Because each chapter had a different narrator, the perspective shifts, and each of them characterizes their companion similarly that you're able to pin a certain personality on the character involved. I think that this is a good book to recommend for someone who wants to dive into the mystery-thriller genre. The book was straightforward and leans to the genre formula but does it in a way that it keeps you reading to know what happens next.

I usually like this author, but I found this book to be rambling and confusing. I read till the end, where there was a great twist, but by then, I really wasn't bothered. With a good edit, this would be a much tighter read.

I want to start by saying I have loved all of Simon Lelics other books and I hate leaving bad reviews but this just wasn’t for me. I wasn’t gripped at all I didn’t enjoy the writing style and felt it affected the flow of the story and made it stilted. I got to 60% in and skim read the rest and the ending was as I had suspected. I will read from Simon as I have enjoyed everything else but this one definitely wasn’t for me. Thanks to Netgalley, the author and Penguin for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. A teenaged girl has disappeared from a south coast seaside town. Her bag has been found and her jacket was discovered on the banks of the river, with blood on the hood. Rob Fleet and his team are convinced she's been murdered, but so far have failed to find a body. Frustrated by the lack of progress, the girl's twin brother and 4 friends decide to search the woods. The story of what happened is told via witness statements to the police, and it becomes clear that secrets are being kept, and that the search ended with someone dying. This is a real page turner, which I thoroughly recommend. Thanks to NetGalley for a preview copy.
Copied to Goodreads.

I am a great fan of Stephen King and can understand the comparison between him and Lelic. This was a fascinating and compelling read. I was hooked from the beginning and was both moved and scared in equal measure. I was surprised at the ending but what a roller coaster of a ride.

The story started really well and I was looking forward to reading it however I felt that though the plot and characters were great, the story started dragging at places and it just needed to get there a bit faster. The story line was really good though.

This was the perfect amounts of creepy and compelling. It made me shiver at so many points when the kids were in the woods. WOODS + KIDS + DARK = disaster. I enjoyed the whodunnit element and the different ‘clues’ that were revealed as the book went on. I liked that right until the end I still couldn’t piece it together. Well paced, terrifying and dark, The Search Party is a great thriller.

One for young adults , who would love this. Good characterisation and some nice prose. Told from different perspectives it’s a good read

Really enjoyed this book. Often there is a disappointment in terms of being able to easily predict what's going to happen within this genre....not so here. Found it very hard to put down and it did not leave me wanting.

I did like the writing style of this book. I enjoyed reading from each characters perspective, both from the ‘suspects’ and the detective. It provided a good look at how things are always seen slightly differently from each person. Although this book wasn’t apparently specifically for young adults, I kept checking that that wasn’t the case. It seems perfect for young adults who enjoy mysteries and thrillers. Being an oldie, I didn’t really relate to the characters, and found their teenage histrionics annoying. It did keep me guessing almost to the end though. Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the advanced copy.

I felt the need to stop and reflect before writing this review. Some books have an instant effect on you either good or bad and a review is easy to write but some take a bit more reflection which isn’t a bad thing. For a crime thriller I think this book is more character driven and thoughtful than many books in this genre, The story slowly cleverly evolves through the interviews of a group of friends who form a search party to look for their missing friend and the lead detective as he tries to track down the missing girl. It deals with the complicated relationships between friends and families, the unseen jealousies and envy that can be destructive. This book is really well written, and I like the premise of the book, which is written from a slightly different perspective. I liked the lead detective character and would definitely be happy to follow his journey in future books.

I really enjoyed this book, the plot twists certainly keep the reader on their toes, there is literally no let up with how gripping this book is, absolutely superb

This was a great read. I found it quite slow and hard to get into at the start, but by the middle I was hooked.

It's well written. It flashes from focusing on the detective to each teenager being interviewed after the incident. This was a bit distracting at first, but once I was used to it I found it helpful to read from the different points of views of each character.

I have the other books written by this author on my TBR and hope to get through them soon.

Thank you so much to the publisher for providing me with a copy of this E-book to review via Netgalley.

Simon Lelic is a fantastic author and I have read some of his other books which are fantastic

I was so excited to read this but unfortunately I couldn't relate to the characters who are mainly teenagers.
This book has a great, if familiar premise. Teenager Sadie goes missing and her friends decide that they will form the search party to find her as they feel that no-one knows Sadie or the town better than them.
This is a compelling story and I would definitely recommend it to young adult readers who are interested in the thriller genre

The search party follows an unusual format. The author uses a multi-narrative, telling the story of the key characters as they relay their story in a police interview. When 16 year old Sadie Saunders goes missing, her friends Abi, Cora, Mason, Fash, and her twin brother, Luke set out into the woods to find her.

Woven throughout these, we have the story of Detective inspector Fleet, both personally and professionally. and I particularly enjoyed this thread of the story.

It took me a while to get into the flow of the book. I suspect because of the frequent change of perspective and not being able to identify with the young characters. However, having said that, the author does a great job of creating atmosphere and building suspense, while we follow what happened in the woods, They also kept us guessing til the end and the final twist worked well.

Thanks to net galley for the ARC.

I’ve read an earlier book by Lelic and he was good then, and he’s good now - pulls every trick in the book but it [s more than ‘just’ entertainment, although it definitely is that - we care about these people, hunting each other down, and we learn about them as we go, just in time to be surprised. The ending is a great surprise ... it’s a kind of locked door crime story ... I like the variety of hunters. Really adept, and confirms my sense that this is a terrific writer I want to read again.

This is my first Simon Lelic and I'm not gonna lie - I just loved it.

#NoSpoilers but if you like Alex North, M W Craven, C J Tudor and Lucy Foley The Hunting Party, you'll be in the right space with The Search Party.

Twisty-turny plot, and characters I believed in from the get-go.

Mr Lelic's Search Party has been great company during lockdown.

Cracking Story. Highly recommend.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this review copy. Once I started this novel I could not stop reading until I had finished it. Loved the multiple narrators and the use of the potentially unreliable narrative POV. This was one of the best thrillers I have read in a while.

Well this book certainly keeps you guessing, wondering and thinking! I read it in one sitting and did not guess correctly the end.
I felt all kinds of emotions for all the characters, I liked and disliked them equally at different times.
At the beginning I felt lost and couldn’t keep track of what was happening but then felt maybe this is what the author wanted us to feel to add to the chaos of it all. If so, very cleverly written!!!
I wasn’t sure what was red herrings and what wasn’t but as a fan of thrillers I can now normally see what’s coming but this was a surprise, for me anyway.
It was refreshing to read and not know who did it but also the ‘need’ to know how this kids got into such a mess. I enjoyed the plot being centred around the teenagers and the messy ness of how they dealt with the fall out of these series of events. Enjoyable!!!